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Jeffrey Blackwell spent his entire policing career – his entire life – in Columbus.

Until two weeks ago, that is, when he committed himself to Cincinnati.

The Queen City’s new police chief began wearing the Columbus badge in 1987, after nearly being rejected from the force for admitting he used cocaine twice within the year preceding his application.

But the parking ticket writer, who grew up in a low-income Columbus neighborhood, didn’t back down, fighting for his employment. In the end, he was hired and then shot up the Columbus ranks, gaining the best score on every promotional exam all the way to deputy chief before being passed over for chief in 2012.

With 26 years of police work under his belt, he chose instead to apply elsewhere, and last month Cincinnati accepted his offer, choosing Blackwell from more than 30 candidates who applied from across the country, including popular internal candidate and Interim Chief Paul Humphries.

A full review of Blackwell’s personnel file and interviews with people with whom he’s worked paint a picture of a dedicated street cop who never forgot about the disadvantaged.

Blackwell leaves behind a more traditional police department – still relatively authoritarian and reactive to crime, many say – to lead Cincinnati’s, which was first forced to reform after the race riots but has become widely respected as one of the more progressive and proactive departments in the country for its community-oriented policing model.

The challenge for Blackwell will be to further Cincinnati’s success. He plans to encourage new ways to engage the community – like focusing more intently on quality-of-life issues – and reaching urban youth.

Blackwell draws praise for grunt work, dedication

In his early years, Blackwell’s bosses cheered his street smarts, innovative ideas and gusto, and those who have seen him work in more recent years say he never stopped working directly with citizens as he rose through the ranks.

Blackwell’s ability to talk to people and extract key information to solve crimes is mentioned often in his 243-page personnel file, and his skills were tapped consistently – in 1991 he and three other patrol officers were taken off their beats to work cold murder cases, solving five in roughly three months.

“These four officers ... demonstrated a very high degree of personal initiative and constantly performed substantially above the normal requirements,” Columbus Sgt. Glenn Eggleston wrote in his recommendation for the men to receive a Medal of Merit for the homicide pilot program.

Within his personnel file are also a dozen or so complaints, most of which were determined by a review board to either be unfounded or without enough evidence to be sustained, aside from a few in 2002 ranging from a violation of police rules to threats or harassment.

Complaints aside, Blackwell’s move to Cincinnati is Columbus’ loss, believes Deanna Wilkinson, a criminologist and expert on urban youth violence and an associate professor in the Department of Human Sciences at Ohio State University.

Wilkinson met Blackwell when he joined the Youth Violence Prevention Advisory Board, which Wilkinson created after being awarded a federal grant from the National Institute of Justice to establish new strategies for averting Columbus youth from lives of violence and crime, a continuation of her earlier work in New York, where she interviewed and documented the lives of 416 young men involved in gun violence.

She said she could always count on Blackwell to provide an important link to crime data and compassion toward young people.

“He’s very consistent, from the beginning to the end,” Wilkinson said. “He starts with listening and doesn’t try to force his view on other people.”

It was an approach Wilkinson didn’t often see from Columbus police, adding that “lots of people ... will say the Columbus police department has a fairly traditional policing approach. ... (There is) still a lot of division between the police and the community.”

Some in Columbus wish he'd become chief there

Cecil Ahad, a resident of a south side Columbus neighborhood determined by Wilkinson’s research as one of the most violent parts of the city, also vouches for Blackwell.

“He believes in working in a community,” said Ahad, the owner of a janitorial and maintenance business who is involved in organizing monthly peace marches in the neighborhood, which Blackwell encouraged and attended. “He supports people like me to change the community.”

After such grass-roots efforts began in the neighborhood, more than two years passed without a single homicide, Wilkinson said, until this summer, when six people were shot and killed in a month’s time. Still, they’ll press on without Blackwell, Ahad said.

“We wish Jeff could have stayed here and become the chief,” he said.

With the creation of the ABC’s of CPD and CFD program, Blackwell found a way to spread the message that police are not the enemy, says Napoleon Bell, executive director of Columbus’ Community Relations Commission.

The interactive educational program first was created to release tensions between police and Columbus’ large Somali community after a law-enforcement officer shot and killed a Somali resident.

Police realized the Somalis didn’t understand the police and the police didn’t understand the Somalis, Bell said, so Blackwell led the creation of the ABC’s program, which informs the audience through hands-on activities – how and why police and firefighters do what they do. The literature was printed in Somali and the presentation was interpreted by a native speaker to the roughly 45 Somalis who showed up, Bell said.

Since 2006 the ABC’s have been adapted for different groups and presented probably a hundred times, Bell said. It’s even a live show on public access television.

Today, Columbus shares the program as a best practice in conferences across the country.

“When (Blackwell) did the ABC’s, he sat there answering questions for hours afterward,” Bell said. “A lot of people don’t know the volunteerism ... he does off work ... always out working with different little leagues, at basketball games, mentoring the Ohio State basketball players.”

Picking up where James Craig left off

In his short time here, Blackwell says he can tell Cincinnati is a good department, because the officers care about the community and are intelligent in their approach, using crime data and engaging the public in a variety of ways.

Blackwell faces high expectations as the second man ever tasked to lead the Cincinnati Police Department without rising through its ranks. He is following former Chief James Craig, who was widely embraced by the rank-and-file and the community but left the Queen City after less than two years to become Detroit’s top cop.

Blackwell takes control at a time when the budget is tight but Cincinnati’s police union says a recruit class is necessary. He faces the challenge of winning over the rank-and-file and the community as he evaluates what needs to be changed.

“If I were to come in and instantly try to make changes and leave my footprints all over, it would send a message to the men and women (of the department) that something is broken or not being done well,” Blackwell said. “And that’s certainly not the message that I want to convey.”

One of his first actions has been to reverse part of the uniform policy Craig set in place – requiring officers to wear their hats during detail and traffic duties, an unpopular requirement among beat cops.

He hints at upcoming changes to CPD’s organizational structure and the Cincinnati Initiative to Reduce Violence program.

But more than anything, Blackwell says he’ll focus on ways to strengthen Cincinnati’s community-oriented policing model to focus on quality of life issues – “lighting in alleys, needles, graffiti, trash, loud noise, teenage problems,” he says – reduce crime and the fear of crime.

“The relationship has to be authentic,” Blackwell says. “Officers have to get to know folks in their community by name – and not just the bad ones.” ⬛

Investigation could follow Blackwell from Columbus

Federal investigators continue to explore whether Columbus police officers who worked under Blackwell sold, kept for themselves or inappropriately handed out surplus military equipment given to the Columbus Police Division by the U.S. Department of Defense.

“No charges have ever been filed.” Jason Pappas, president of Fraternal Order of Police Local 9, which represents Columbus police officers, told The Enquirer. “But the criminal investigation is still ongoing.”

A Columbus city janitor is also part of the probe, Pappas said.

Through the years Columbus has received items worth $9.4 million (when originally bought by the Department of Defense) but details of the investigation, including what items were mishandled and how they were mishandled, have not been disclosed, Pappas said.

One of the police officers, Steven E. Dean, has since retired. The other, Chad M. Knode – identified in reporting by The Columbus Dispatch – has been on restricted duty for about a year and a half, Pappas said.

To his knowledge, Blackwell has never been a suspect in the case, Pappas said.

Blackwell says he had no knowledge of wrongdoing in the office that was several levels below his direct command and when he supervised 300-400 officers.

City Manager Milton Dohoney Jr. has said he is aware of the investigation and stood up for Blackwell.

“If there is something tangible, as it relates to Chief Blackwell directly, that’s one thing,” Dohoney said. “But if there are issues or questions regarding someone under his supervision that’s entirely different.

“There are 5,000-plus people that work for this (Cincinnati) government ... There have been people who have worked here that have been investigated since I have been here. While I have been concerned about that, that didn’t necessarily mean I had done anything. So if there is something credible coming out of it that needs to be looked at, obviously we would, but I’m not concerned about that at this point.”

I cover the West Side of Cincinnati and western Hamilton County as well as public safety agencies including the Cincinnati Police Department. Find me at csmith@enquirer.com